


By Fridge-light

by shambling



Category: Rivers of London - Ben Aaronovitch
Genre: Gen, Pre-Slash, Pyjamas
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-05
Updated: 2019-02-05
Packaged: 2019-10-22 21:55:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17670833
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shambling/pseuds/shambling
Summary: Peter just wants a glass of water, what he gets is more of an eyeful





	By Fridge-light

**Author's Note:**

> What can I say. I've got a very resolute headcanon that Nightingale has pyjamas posher than anything Peter owns.
> 
> Pre-slash if you squint (not very hard) might add some more.

I didn't realise i'd never actually seen Nightingale in pyjamas until I did.

I'd seen him in hospital certainly, but in that instance he was wearing a hospital approved pale green gown and so I don't think it counts.

Nightingale doesn't just get dressed for breakfast, he dresses for breakfast whereas its a good day if i've put clothes rather than tracksuit bottoms on. Nightingales idea of casual is a polo-shirt and a cricket jumper. He is, quite literally, from another era.

So really, I shouldn't have been that surprised by his pyjamas.

I hadn't meant to see it. I'd been sleeping in my room at the folly, a little the worse for a drink, and had woken up in the night, needing a wee and then subsequently a drink. I'd thought about just drinking it out of the bathroom tap and moving on, but once I was up i'd decided that paracetamol was in order and therefore a glass. That was what had me heading off to the kitchen. I was cautious, remembering what i'd run into the last time I went downstairs in the night, which is why I was creeping along, and why I didn't turn on the lights. That, and the headache, threatening at the back of my eyes. 

Now, if you'd asked me to imagine what Nightingale wore in bed, which I might have done on occasion, and if I didn't go with the very first thing to cross my mind - he doesn't sleep he hands upside down from the ceiling- or the second - another suit?- then, i'd've had to say I imagined it would be striped cotton matching. Like the animated boy in the snowman wears. For all I know he does have a pair like that, for special occasions maybe. 

What he was wearing that night wasn't striped cotton. From the distance of the kitchen doorway, outlined by the light from the fridge, i'd've said they were silk. Silky at the very least. Navy blue, with a shimmery, dark gold piping, and a very subtle pinstripe running through them. They matched beautifully with the dressing gown he was wearing, also blue, although a subtly different shade, i'd've said midnight blue if I was feeling poetic. The colour of a really great pair of indigo jeans. That had a subtle self pattern of paisleys swirling across it, again in a very slightly different shade of blue, which looked as though someone had picked it out to complement his eyes. It had a braided belt, also gold, hanging open and somehow still emphasising his waist. It's really unfair what over a hundred years of magic and boxing can do to a physique. The whole combination gave off the air of having been bought in your actual colonies and kept in perfect condition ever since. 

Incongruously, his feet were bare, which gave the whole thing and even more louche air, and I had the strongest feeling that if he were to turn, the pyjama top would be open in a deep V. His hair was slightly ruffled from sleep, clearly he was resting as well as me after a night at the pub. 

I swallowed, stared once more for good measure, and then, silently, crept away from the door and back to the stairs, stepping over the one which creaks, resolving to drink some water out of the tap and paracetamol be damned. But as soon as I was back in bed, I found I couldn't quite get the image out of my mind to sleep.


End file.
